DECKJrBER 9, 
THK COTTAGE GARDENER. 
175 
WEEKLY CALENDAR. 
I 
M W 
1) U 
DECEMBER 9-15, 1852. 
Weather near London in 1851. 
llaromcter. Thermo. Wind. Rain in In. 
Sun 
Rises. I 
Sun 
Sets. 
Moon 
U. &S. 
Moon’s 
Age. 
, Clock 
aft. Sun. 
Day of 
Year. 
q Th 
Red-throated Diver comes. 
30.189 — 30.091 54—52 
s.w. — 
56 a. 7 
49 a. 3 
5 25 
28 
7 
14 
344 
lU F 
Wild Sw an conies. 
,30.057 — 29.981 53—33 
s. — 
68 
49 
6 52 
29 
0 
46 
345 
11 s 
Grosbeak seen. 
30.521 —30.366 51—27 
w. — 
59 
49 
sets. 
@ 
6 
18 
346 
12 ShN 
3 Sunday in Advent. 
30.516 — 30.442. 38—30 
N.W. — 
VlII 
49 
.5 a 8 
1 
5 
50 
347 
K) M 
Lucy. 
30.404 —30.389 44—37 
E. — 
0 
49 
6 15 
2 
5 
22 
346 , 
14 To 
Stinking Hellebore flowers. 
30 . 472 —30.416 41 — 36 
E. — 
1 
49 
7 27 
3 
4 
53 
349 1 
15 \V 
Ember Week. 
30.437—30.387 40—36 
S. 01 
2 
49 
8 42 
4 
i 4 
23 
350 1 
Meteorology or the Week. —At Chiswick, from observations during; the last twenty-five years, the averaffe hiarhest and lowest tempera- 
i turesof these days are 46.2° and 34.1 
° respectively. Ihe greatest heat, Ul°, occurred on the 13th in 1842 ; and the lowest col< 
, IP 
, on the 13th ! 
1 in 1846, During the period 106 days 
were fine, and on 09 rain fell. 
1 
WINGED TOBACCO PLANT. 
{Nicornina alula.') 
This is a tondor annual, and a native of South Brazil. 
It belongs to the Natural Order of Nightshades (Sola- 
nacfiffi), anol to Pentandria Monogynia of the Linna'an 
system. Like other tender annuals of the same family, 
the seeds require to be sown early in spring, on a gentle 
hotbed, and the seedlings, when they have three leaves, to 
be pricked out into small pots, and kept under the same 
frame, and to be moved to their blooming place after re¬ 
potting in May. We extract the following from Paxton’s 
Flower Garden :— 
“ We translate literally the account given of this plant by 
Link and Otto. ‘ The stem is from four to live feet in 
height, branching, with distant, glandular hairs. The leaves 
are from three to four or more inches long, and from one to 
two inches broad; the upper ones are smaller; they are all 
decurrent and form narrow wings on the stem, obtuse, and 
with a small callous point, hut a little repand at the edges, 
and toothed, the teeth having also little callous points, on 
both sides rough with small somewhat closely pressed hairs, 
and at the edges fimiished with distant and glandular hairs. 
The flowers are placed rather far apart from each other on 
a raceme ; the lovver pechcels are one inch long, the upper 
ones are shorter. The rough calyx is not quite an inch in 
length, tubular; its teeth are long and very narrow. The 
flowers are white, and sweet-scented; the tube from two to 
three inches long, a little expanding at the toil; the teeth 
of the limb, eight lines in length, are oval, somewhat ex¬ 
panded, obtuse. Stamens as long as the tube. Style some¬ 
what longer. Capsules oblong. The seeds of this plant 
wore sent by M. Sello, in 1827, from Brazil. They should 
bo sown in the spring in pots, and the seedlings should be 
planted out in the open ground wdien the frosts are gone. 
The plant is hardy, and may be kept in winter in a tem¬ 
perature of from d8° to 4d° Fahr., and as such plants as are 
strongest flower best and jiroduco most seeds, they should 
be so treated. The soil should be light, but rich, and mixed 
with sand. The large, white, odoriferous flowers, forming 
nice-looking tufts, render the plant suitable for bedding-out. 
The flowers close in the day-time and hang down, but open 
at night. If the weather is cloudy they open ns early as 
flve, P.M., but if clear, not before six-and-a-half, p.m. ; in 
like tnanner they shut in the morning at six if the weather 
be clear, but not before seven if it be overcast.’ 
“ Such is the account given by Link and Otto, of a plant 
which we think is beyond all doubt what Sir Henry "Willock 
found cultivated in I’ersia, and sent to England as the 
source of Shiraz Tobacco ; in consequence of which it was 
called N. persica by one of us, and, according to M. Walpers, 
y. decurrens, by Bishop Agardh. We must, however, observe 
that the Persian plant was not observed to he a perenni.al; 
nor do tiie leaves appear to have been so distinctly decurrent 
as is represented in the accompanying figure : but the 
specimens which have been preserved show that the leaves 
were somewhat decurrent, even near the summit of the 
flowering-stem. This identification of plants supposed to be 
distinct, leads to the inquiry of how a South Brazilian iflant 
came to be cultivated in Persia as Tobacco ? and also 
whether any Brazilian Tobacco is manufactured from it ? 
We trust that some one will be able to answer these 
questions, as well as many others connected with the history 
of commercial Tobacco; as, for instance, is any Havannah 
Tobacco prepared from N. ainplexicauUs, as George Don 
reported ? Is the white-flowered Guatemala Tobacco a 
species distinct from the Bed Virginian, N. Tahacnni !■ Are 
the red-flowered Tobaccos all varieties of N. Tnhacum 1 or 
do they belong to difi’erent species, as some pretend? AVhat 
yields the pitchy Tobacco of Latakia; or the mild Tobacco 
of Syria? The Djebele seems to belong to N. Tahacmn. Is 
it true that Ah is cultivated in the East? How 
came N. rnstica to be grown in Egypt and Tunis, where it 
produces the fragrant but strong Tombaki Tobacco, which 
was shown at the Great Exhibition of all Nations ? Of what 
country i.s N. ruslica certainly a native? All these are in¬ 
teresting questions, to not one of which we believe can a 
satisfactory answer be found in hooks. N. alula is lost in 
English gardens, hut might perhaps be recovered from 
Berlin.” 
It is a paradoxical but explicable Kentish proverb, that 
“ Tenterden church steeple was the origin of the Good¬ 
win Sands; ” and we have heard of a shipwreck being 
shewn satisfactorily to have been caused by the vessel 
having sailed ou a Friday; but out of five letters, all 
accusing Guano of being the cause of the Potato 
murrain, we cannot trace even the pretence of a reason, 
much less of evidence, on which our five correspondents 
No. CCXIX., VoL. IX. 
